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I'm a programmer. I'm told I often use 'else' like the if ... else statement in a programming language. For example, this text message I sent yesterday:

Hey, if you haven't had lunch wanna go to the tavern? Else [do you want to see] the latest Hobbit movie?

  • Is this sentence grammatically correct?
  • Are there any examples of where a programming language has influenced or changed the English language?
Jon Hanna
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geometrikal
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    You're not even using else the way it is used in programming. You're using more like "On a completely separate note..." – Jim Jan 05 '15 at 06:26
  • @Jim perhaps a poor example. The logic is there, just implied. – geometrikal Jan 05 '15 at 06:41
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    so if your friend responded with, "Yes, I saw it last night.' How would you proceed with the conversation? – Jim Jan 05 '15 at 06:44
  • @Jim I'll just change the bloody question. – geometrikal Jan 05 '15 at 06:45
  • I can't see how this doesn't bear out an if…else relation (even before the edit). If (you haven't had lunch) { wanna go to the tavern? } else if (you have had lunch) { have you seen / wanna go see the movie? }. @Jim, if anyone answered “Yes, I saw it last night” (to the original question), I would assume they had already had lunch, and they therefore answered the else question, so I'd suggest a different movie instead for example. Seems perfectly logical to me. – Janus Bahs Jacquet Jan 05 '15 at 10:10
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    @JanusBahsJacquet Me, I’m a touch surprised that so many people appear to consider else used as a synonym for otherwise to be ungrammatical. – tchrist Jan 05 '15 at 14:41
  • @JanusBahsJacquet- You have properly parsed it as a programming else. I just have a feeling that if someone were to do that in casual conversation the asker would likely think, "Ok, but you haven't answered my question about lunch, do you wanna go or not." – Jim Jan 05 '15 at 14:55
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    I'm surprised no one's mentioned FORTRAN's effect on Shakespeare; his frequent use of GO TO is an example. Go to, I’ll no more on ’t. It hath made me mad. (Hamlet, Act 3, Scene 1). As we all know, GO TO is now considered harmful, and its seed was planted at about the same time as the seed of commercial tobacco, which is also now considered harmful. – John Lawler Jan 05 '15 at 14:57
  • Applying propositional logic to natural language seems to be a programming influence. As in nerds who answer questions like "Did that site crash on its own, or were you doing something on the server that caused it to?" with "Yes" – RemcoGerlich Jan 05 '15 at 15:35
  • !likely; // character count food – Andrew Lazarus Jan 08 '15 at 08:54

2 Answers2

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Some obvious points: 1) the wording you used in your text message is not evidence of a wider phenomenon, and 2) the logic of an if...else programming statement is not manifested in your message.

Regarding your question about the grammaticality of "Else have you seen the latest Hobbit movie?" the answer is that it isn't, because you are using 'else' in a grammatically non-standard way.

I'm unaware of a programming language having influenced English other than through the coining of domain-related terminology; thankfully, nobody I know structures their everyday speech like a computer program.

Erik Kowal
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  • I have seen people who always put a "then", in sentences that start with "if" , even where "then" is not called for by any convention of English grammar. – Brian Hitchcock Jan 05 '15 at 05:55
  • @BrianHitchcock - Maybe so, but the linguistic influence has been in the opposite direction: the logic of "if...then" has been adopted by programmers from an existing English usage, not vice versa. That being the case, it would be rather difficult to demonstrate that the inclusion of an optional 'then' was the direct result of an influence emanating from a programming practice. – Erik Kowal Jan 05 '15 at 06:04
  • Edited the question to satisfy 2) – geometrikal Jan 05 '15 at 06:47
  • Your second sentence is incorrect. Please check the OED, where it has clear citations for this use. – tchrist Jan 05 '15 at 14:25
  • That use of "Else" is not non-standard. It is a bit archaic though. – slebetman Apr 10 '15 at 08:49
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Else = Otherwise

The question of grammaticality is yes. OED sense 4 covers this, and it has four subsenses:

  1. a. In another case, under other circumstances; otherwise, on any other supposition; if not.

    b. preceded by or. Also OR ELSE, with aposiopesis (the alternative to be imagined), as a colloq. form of warning or threat.

    c. idiomatically. = ‘If it is not believed’. Now rare or dial.

    d. qualifying an adj. rhetorical.

And here are a couple of its citations for 4a:

  • 1837 J. H. Newman Par. Serm. (ed. 3) I. v. 115 ― Else how should any one be saved?
  • 1873 Browning Red Cott. Night-C. 115 ― Boughs above, Darken, deform the path, else sun would streak.

So else can indeed start an independent clause, in which case it means otherwise. This is grammatical.

Else = Elsewise

In this sense, else is equivalent to elsewise, which per the OED means:

In some other manner; in other circumstances, otherwise.

One of the citations for using elsewise in this way is from the last novel of Charles Dickens:

1865 Dickens Our Mutual Friend I. 97 ― Elsewise the world got up at eight.

So you could use elsewise instead of just plain else, but that one might get you talked about, since some people don’t realize it’s even a word. Then again, apparently you already get flack for using else in a grammatical way as though it were some sort of violation of grammar when it is not.

tchrist
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